{"id":31010,"date":"2014-03-28T14:52:39","date_gmt":"2014-03-28T06:52:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tribune.ctsi-logistics.com\/?p=31010"},"modified":"2014-03-28T14:52:39","modified_gmt":"2014-03-28T06:52:39","slug":"oia-governors-must-enforce-findings-abc-report","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/oia-governors-must-enforce-findings-abc-report\/","title":{"rendered":"OIA: Governors must enforce findings of ABC report"},"content":{"rendered":"

Office of Insular Affairs Director Nik Pula said yesterday that governors of Guam, the CNMI, American Samoa, and the U.S. Virgin Islands are expected to implement the findings of an OIA-commissioned study that identified the needed repairs and renovations of school facilities in insular areas.<\/span>
\nThe study, \u201cAssessment on Buildings and Classrooms,\u201d was conducted by the U.S. Army Corps last year and included five phases that require governors to allocate no less than $1 million for each project phase.<\/p>\n

In an interview with Saipan Tribune yesterday, Pula said that OIA\u2019s focus is on a healthy and safe environment for schoolchildren, and that should be among the top priorities of each insular government.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe asked the U.S. Army Corps to do this study and we went to four territories: Guam, American Samoa, Virgin Islands, and the CNMI. They have different sorts of maintenance and renovation needs, but the things we focused on first is the \u2018health and safety\u2019 to make sure that we have a safe environment for schoolchildren. And because we\u2019re the one that commissioned the ABC report, we\u2019re hoping that the governors would comply with it,\u201d Pula said after a two-hour closed-door meeting with local education leaders at Hyatt Regency Saipan.<\/p>\n

Pula cited the unique situation of insular areas where \u201cdecay is very fast\u201d due to the salty ocean waters surrounding the islands.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe idea behind this study is not only to look after the schools\u2026but to institutionalize the maintenance,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

In the case of the CNMI, Pula disclosed that OIA has been providing CIP funding ranging from $8 million to $10 million each year. For the ABC report to be enforced, governors can use both \u201cfuture\u201d and \u201cunutilized\u201d CIP monies from Interior, he added.<\/p>\n

\u201cI know that there\u2019s never enough money to do everything, so prioritizing is very important,\u201d said Pula, adding that allocation of how much money would go to implement the ABC findings depends entirely on the governor.<\/p>\n

\u201c[Funding for the ABC report implementation] basically will come from the future CIP [for each insular areas] because we just started it [study]. But if there are some [CIP] monies not being used, the government can utilize that\u2026it\u2019s up to the governor,\u201d he explained. \u201cOIA would love to have them [governors] follow the ABC report.\u201d<\/p>\n

Yesterday morning, OIA awarded the CNMI government $7.4 million in CIP funds.<\/p>\n

Today, Pula is scheduled to meet with the local CIP office to look into the status of federally funded initiatives. Although he cannot immediately say if there remains \u201cunutilized CIP monies\u201d in the CNMI, Pula recalled that there was a substantial amount marked as \u201cunused\u201d in previous years.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn the past we had concerns about the moving of the projects, maybe in the arena of $30 million. They\u2019ve been allocated to certain projects, but we just don\u2019t know yet how fast it is moving. That\u2019s what we will find out tomorrow in our meeting with CIP,\u201d he told Saipan Tribune.<\/p>\n

Education Commissioner Dr. Rita A. Sablan disclosed yesterday that PSS has over $11 million worth of deferred maintenance.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe direction of OIA is that the government of four insular areas will support the plan with no less than $1 million each fiscal year for the next five years beginning fiscal year 2015,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Is the ABC report the answer to PSS\u2019 problems on repairs and maintenance of facilities?<\/p>\n

\u201cNo. Because these are deferred maintenance so we\u2019re talking about over $11 million worth of maintenance needed within PSS. So we are grateful to OIA because CIP monies will help fund part of it,\u201d Sablan said.<\/p>\n

Under the PSS\u2019 $40 million proposed budget for fiscal 2015, $1.5 million is earmarked for school repairs and renovations.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Office of Insular Affairs Director Nik Pula said yesterday that governors of Guam, the CNMI,…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":34,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[89,26,40,44],"class_list":["post-31010","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-news","tag-cip","tag-cnmi","tag-pss","tag-study"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31010","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/34"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=31010"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31010\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31010"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31010"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31010"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}